The Trouble with Knives
by professor stampede
Summary: Immediately following the TV series, Meryl and Millie get into an accident with Knives, who is still recovering from his battle wounds. Weird, weird, weird.


The doc walked through the door into the waiting room, where he was greeted by three intense, yet hopeful, stares. He kept a straight face nonetheless, and in doing so, the three stares got more intense, yet less hopeful. Doc glanced at the man in the middle and said in a serious tone, "Vash, we've got news about your brother." 

Vash leaped to feet, then ran over and held Doc by his shoulders. "What? What???" Vash exclaimed, shaking Doc back in forth in panic. "Is he alright? Oh God, oh God, please say he's fine." 

"Um..." Doc started. 

"I did all I could to harm him as little as possible! I used all my skill to make sure this didn't happen!" Vash pushed Doc dramatically to the side, making him fall over. "But now what? Oh, Doc, tell me he's alright!" 

"Well..." Doc muttered, getting back to his feet. 

"But it's not fair! He had so much more to live for, he was just a little disoriented! Doc, what are you waiting for? Tell us how Knives is!" 

"You see..." 

"And I had no choice! I..." 

"VASH, SHUT UP!" Meryl butted in from the waiting chair she sitting in. "Now, Doctor, is Knives alive?" 

"YES HE IS, GODDAMNIT!" Doc cried. 

"Well, that wasn't a very nice way to put it," Vash replied. 

Doc gave a harsh stare to Vash, then looked to Meryl and Millie. "Apparently he is a very fast healer, and should survive the bullet wounds. No vital organs were injured, but he did suffer some major blood loss. We think that's why he's been cranky. Anyways, visitation hour starts now, so you three can go in and talk to him if you want. He's in room 82." 

Meryl and Millie got up and walked to the hospital's room 82, Vash leading the way. "Is this all the security they've got around here?" Vash observed on the way there. "It's a wonder Knives hasn't at least tried to break out of here yet." 

They got to the place in the hallway where room 82 should be, but the numbers ended at 81. "Where is it?" Meryl said what everyone else was thinking. Millie walked over to a large, rectangular, black crevice in the wall. "Hey, guys, this thing says 82 on it. Maybe it's the room. It's not a door, though, I wonder how you get in?" 

A small laser beamed out of the crevice, scanning the three of them over. A heavy robotic voice sounded from inside the walls, "_Access Approved_." The black crevice caved into the wall a bit extra, then moved to the side, revealing a massive metal door with strategically placed locks and nails littering the whole front side. Then that automatically opened to another door, which opened to another door, which opened to few more doors, until it made a hallway of doors that lead to Knives' little hospital bedroom. All three of them shrugged their shoulders, and walked in. 

Vash ran up to the side of Knives' bed. He was wrapped with bandages in many places on his body, some of which had small bloodstains showing through. Knives glared at Vash with his bloodshot eyes, which were, for the first time Vash had seen them since they were kids, filled with innocence. "Hrphi Vphsh," he murmured through the bandages strapped across his mouth. 

"No, don't talk, brother, you don't need to," Vash quietly cooed to Knives. "Everything's fine, everything's fine. Now, I have a few very, very important things I must tell you." Vash's stomach made a disgusting rumbling sound. "But first, the potty!" he shouted, then ran off back down the hallway. 

After he left, Meryl and Millie both walked up to his bedside. "So you're Knives," Meryl said to him. "You've sent us all through hell, yet, somehow, I'm glad to see that you're alive." 

"Hrglemph," Knives snorted. 

"What was that? I can't hear you past that bandage over your mouth," Meryl said. "Maybe I should take it off." 

"Nrgh!" Knives yelped. 

"That's funny," Millie commented. "He's trying to talk. Meryl, take that bandage off his mouth so that he can speak." 

"Okay," Meryl agreed. 

"Nrgh! Nrgh! Nrgh!" Knives continued, now looking helplessly at Meryl. 

Meryl dug her fingernails into the space where the bandage ended and could be lifted, then lifted with all her might, tearing that part of the bandage off. 

"AUUUUGH!" Knives screamed at the top of his lungs. His lips were completely missing, and a portion of the space where the bandage had just been were ripped in small pieces, leaving his teeth completely exposed, and not exactly in a smile. Blood gushed everywhere out from the missing chunks of skin for nearly a minute, Knives screaming and wailing the whole time. That is, until most of the rest of his skin went into pallor from the blood loss, and Knives fell limp. 

For another few seconds, neither Meryl nor Millie spoke a word. Slowly, Meryl brought the bandage she had just ripped off to where she could see it, and, sure enough, it was covered with bloody lip chunks. Suddenly taking into her mind what she had just done, she walked up to Knives and put her fingers up to his neck where she could feel his circulation, and, fortunately, his pulse was still going. She breathed a sigh of relief. But, suddenly, his pulse made one last beat and went out. Meryl's eyes bulged with surprise, and, turning to Millie, said, "Um... I think he's dead." 

Millie just stared back at her for awhile, until coming to her senses, quietly said, "Maybe we shouldn't have taken it off. This isn't good, Meryl." 

Just then, footsteps came from outside of the concealed room. "Oh, God, no, Vash!" Meryl gasped. "We can't let him see this! Quick, cover him up! Cover him up!" They both ran up and covered the bed sheets over Knives, making sure nothing, especially his face, showed. 

Vash calmly waltzed into the room. "Wow, it's a long ways to the bathroom from here," Vash laughed. "I nearly wet my pants!" He looked at Meryl, then to Millie, who were both sick with fear and staring at him. "What's wrong, girls?" 

"NOTHING!" they both shouted immediately. "...Absolutely nothing. Everything's fine, fine, Vash," Meryl stumbled. "We were just having a nice chat with Knives, when, uh, when, uh..." 

"...Doc came in!" Millie helped her. 

"Yeah! That's what happened," Meryl said. "And he says he can't see anybody anymore. He needs his rest. So, let's all go now, okay?" 

"But I saw Doc on my way out of the bathroom," Vash replied. "He was operating on another patient." 

"A different one!" Meryl exclaimed. "We have to go now, or Knives will cranky! Come on!" 

Vash stared at her for awhile longer, then glanced to Millie, then back at her. They both still looked sick with fear. After raising an eyebrow, he replied, "Alright. I was going to tell him something, but it looks like I'll have to wait. But what's that in your hand?" 

Meryl looked down in shock, as she noticed she was still holding the bandage in her hand. She yelped and instinctively flung the bandage across the room, which coincidentally landed in the trashcan. After all three of them stared at the trashcan for awhile, Meryl finally came to her senses enough to reply, "Just a piece of trash. Let's go." 

Meryl, Millie, and Vash began to walk together back down the hall together, but Meryl fell back behind Vash and quietly yanked Millie to the side. "What'll we do with Knives?" she intensely whispered to Millie. 

"What do you mean?" Millie whispered back. 

"Well, we can't just leave him there. The doctors will find him, and it will be pretty obvious that he didn't die of natural causes, with his lips ripped off." 

Millie thought to herself. "We could bring him out of here and throw him out the window that's just outside of this room." 

Meryl knew this wouldn't work, seeing that the doctors would still be able to find him, but at least this way it might look like suicide, and they didn't have a choice, anyway. "Okay, then," she agreed. "You go and distract Vash, and I'll sneak him out of the room." 

Millie dashed down the hall after Vash. "Hello, Mr. Vash," she said, trying to make conversation. "Nice weather, isn't it?" 

"Where's Meryl?" Vash asked, looking back down the hall. 

"She forgot something," Millie covered up. "So, do think it will rain?" 

The distraction worked. "Well, if we do have rain, it will be a massive thunderstorm. That's how rain works, out here in the desert and all. And I don't agree that we've been having good weather. Actually, it's been quite hot for the last few decades. And you should try wearing this cool-looking coat out in that weather! It's miserably hot!" Vash continued to ramble on to Millie about the weather while, back in the room, Meryl was still trying to figure out how she'd go about tossing Knives out the window. She had already wrapped the corpse up in his blanket, so that you couldn't see any of him. However, he was way too heavy to carry all by herself, so she had to drag him by his ankles. She struggled back down the hall, until she came to the end, where the same tiny camera that she saw at the beginning scanned Knives' corpse over. When it did, it beeped, "_Access Denied_." Suddenly, a massive metal door slammed down in front of her. She gasped in horror. Then, the camera scanned her over, and beeped, "_Access Approved_." The door opened back up again. "Some security system," she mumbled to herself. 

She walked up and glanced around the corner. Millie and Vash were nowhere to be seen in the medical hallway. Good. She kept dragging Knives out, and walked up to the window of the left. Fortunately, the window was open, so she opened in completely. Then, with all her might, she lugged Knives' body up to the windowsill, and rolled him out. She looked out the window to see how far he would fall out of the building, and, to her astonishment, she realized that in all this commotion, she'd forgotten that the hospital was only a one-story building. However, there was coincidentally a Dumpster just outside of the window, so there Knives laid, dead and in the trash. Meryl reached outside and shut the Dumpster's lid so that no passerbys could look in and see him there. It shut, and she let out a sigh of relief. 

* * * * * *

Back in the waiting room, where Vash and Millie were still talking about the weather, Meryl entered through the door. "Hey, did you get what you forgot back there?" Vash asked her. 

Meryl didn't know what he meant, but she still knew she had to reply, "Yeah. I got it." 

"You know, in celebration of Knives' recovery, I was thinking, maybe we should get together for a night," Vash smiled at Meryl. 

"Oh, with me and Millie?" Meryl stared at him. 

"Actually, no offense to Millie, but I was thinking just us," Vash said to her. 

"I don't mind," said Millie. "I'd like to see you two go out date." 

Meryl blushed. "Okay, I guess I'll have to, then, Vash." 

They all walked out of the doctor's office, with Meryl making sure that they didn't pass by the Dumpster. 

* * * * * *

Meryl glanced down at her watch. Vash was supposed to have been here by now. She was sure of it; she was supposed to meet Vash at the local bar at exactly 8:00. Sure, it wasn't the most romantic spot for a date, but, hey, it's Vash we're talking about here. 

Just then, Vash walked through the doors of the bar. People gave him funny looks, and as he came closer, Meryl noticed it was because his eyes were full of tears. He went up and took a seat on the barstool next to Meryl's. He didn't talk to her immediately, and instead looked over to the bartender and said, "Hey, bartender, give me the hardest stuff you've got." His voice was strained from crying. 

_Oh, no, he must've found out_, Meryl thought to herself. _I could be in very deep trouble now._ "Why so sad, Vash?" she said, trying not to sound worried but failing. 

Vash looked at her for awhile, and, still teary-eyed, replied, "I'm not sad. Don't you hate those onions?" 

Meryl fell over. Not from surprise, but from his onion breath being so bad. Breathing another sigh of relief, she got back onto her barstool. 

"You know, Meryl, there's something I've been meaning to tell you," Vash said to her. She nodded her head, but she herself was paying more attention to her own thoughts. What will happen if they find Knives? What if they don't? Will they know it was she who did it? A million questions buzzed through her head. "I love you," Vash said to her. 

Meryl snapped out of her trance and looked up at Vash. "Huh?" she said. 

Vash looked to the ground. "Oh, it's like that, huh," Vash replied, heartbroken. "Well, I'll leave you to yourself, then. Maybe I'll see you next time, as a friend, of course." This time a real tear came out of his eye, and he moped back out of the door of the bar. 

Meryl, of course, had no idea why he did this, but she was confused enough already. She noticed that while she was thinking and Vash was talking, the bartender had put a large glass of very hard liquor down next to where Vash was sitting. She grabbed it and drank it all. 

* * * * * *

"Okay, you two, it looks like you both have another major assignment to do, now that Vash the Stampede seems to have stopped terrorizing people," said the boss. 

"Yes, sir," Millie replied happily. Meryl just stared at him blankly. With all the guilt built up in her system, not to mention the after-effects of lots and lots of alcohol, the last thing she felt like doing was tackling a new assignment. 

"Apparently, his brother has escaped from a local hospital." Both Meryl and Millie gagged in astonishment when he said that. "He is rumored to be even more destructive then his brother. Your task is to find him and make sure that he doesn't cause any more damage. I expect him back in that hospital, do you hear me? He can't be that hard to catch, if he is, indeed, as sick as he is." 

Millie quickly regained her posture, and replied, "You can count on us, chief!" Meryl fainted backwards, but Millie caught her before she fell completely over. Dragging her out of that room and into their office, Millie threw Meryl on her chair, and Meryl woke up. 

"What are we going to do, Meryl?!" Millie cried. 

Dazed, Meryl replied, "I have no idea. We're really deep into this." 

Millie thought to herself. "Well, if he's where he should be, then he's still outside of the hospital window, right?" 

"No. He landed in the Dumpster." 

"Even better!" Millie exclaimed. "That way, he should be in the dump yard! We could find him, and report that he died there! No one will be the wiser!" 

Once again, Meryl knew it wouldn't work, but decided it was worth a shot. "Alright, Millie. Let's go." 

* * * * * *

The dump yard smelled of rotten eggs, old cheese, and worse. They decided to begin their search where most everything seemed to be the freshest, toward the top of the huge mound where the garbage trucks were dumping the most things off. 

A scraggly old man wearing nothing but underpants and an old T-shirt that said 'disco rules' on it ran up to them. "Have any money for a broke old beggar?" he asked them. 

"I don't give money to strangers, especially old farts like you," Meryl snorted at him. "And who knows what you'll spend it on?" 

"Damn!" he grunted, taking off his shirt and underwear, revealing a very expensive business suit. "I hate it when people see through my disguise! And it's such an easy way to make weekend money..." He walked off in another direction. Meryl and Millie looked at each other and shrugged. 

Continuing their search for over three hours, they finally came to Knives' body. Wrapping it back up in the blanket, which had since fallen off the corpse, they carried him out of the dump yard, to go show it to their boss. 

* * * * * *

Knives' body lay down on the floor between Meryl and Millie, and their boss. 

"What luck!" their boss exclaimed. "Now there is absolutely nothing to worry about! I'll take care of the corpse for you two, and you two investigators can have a few days off. Thanks, this really gets a workload off the company's shoulders! If I didn't know any better, I'd say that you two killed him yourselves!" 

Meryl chuckled nervously. "Well, you know us, we can snoop out anything..." 

* * * * * *

Meryl was glad to be back at her little house. While she was chasing Vash all over the planet, she had gotten a bit homesick. Now, she had her own little place again, where she could go to every night without worries. Sure, it wasn't much of a fancy house on her pay, but, still, it was good to be home. 

She took her cup of coffee to her lips and took a light swig. Picking up her paper, she spit all that back out, seeing in big letter on the front page, "_Vash the Stampede's Brother Dead_". Reading on, the article talked about how Millie and she found him dead. 

Before she could read the whole article, a knocking came from her front door. She got up and walked over to it. "Who is it?" she called. 

"Vash," came from behind the door. She jumped, startled. What would she tell him? 

Slowly, she opened the door. "Hey, Vash," she greeted him. "Have you heard the... news?" 

"Yes," Vash said, smiling. "I really can't wait until they build that new hard liquor bar." 

Meryl couldn't help but smile, but that smile quickly faded. "No Vash. I mean the news about Knives." 

Vash's smile faded as well. "Yeah. He's dead. You... found him, right?" 

Meryl looked down. She knew that if she was ever going to tell him what really happened, then now would be the time. "Vash, I have a confession to make," she murmured. 

"About what? You killing him?" 

Meryl jumped back startled. "Um, yeah. How did you know?" 

"Well, when we were in the hallway, I heard you talking to Millie." He pointed to his ear. "I've got sharp hearing." 

Meryl let out an abrupt cry. "I'm sorry, Vash!" she whined. 

Vash smiled, a small tear coming into his eye, but then dripping down. "That's sweet, Meryl. But you know what's funny? He was probably going to die, anyways! When I saw Doc on my way back from the bathroom, he said that there was only a 10% chance of him actually pulling through, and if he was going to die, he'd do it sometime during our visiting hour. So, actually, he really did die on his own." He smiled bigger. "You can't kill someone like Knives by tearing their lips off." 

Meryl breathed yet another sigh of relief. They embraced and kissed. Kuro Neko popped its head through the door and said, "Nyaa." 


End file.
